


In the Shadow of a Gunman

by cattlaydee



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Angst, Assassination Attempt(s), I honestly don't even know, M/M, QPQVerse, Religion, The West Wing - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-26
Updated: 2016-03-26
Packaged: 2018-05-29 08:13:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6366361
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cattlaydee/pseuds/cattlaydee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The President of the United States has been shot. Alexander Hamilton doesn't believe in God.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In the Shadow of a Gunman

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Quid Pro Quo](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5880157) by [rillrill](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rillrill/pseuds/rillrill). 



> I'm 100% ripping the title off of West Wing because this is inspired by musings from QPQ creator's [rillrill's tumblr](http://www.lizdexia.tumblr.com/), as well as the episodes "The Shadow of Two Gunmen" and "Two Cathedrels" from The West Wing, and basically I hope this somehow works, I just started typing and two hours later, this happened. So.

When Alexander Hamilton thinks of God, it is not florid imagery of bearded white men in robes, arm's raised in some sort of exultant gesture that comes to mind, but the memory of his mother, weary and battle worn, on her knees in front of a statue with faded coloring of the Holy Mother. Her eyes are closed, and she's swaying gently as she prays fervently, her lips moving fast, her voice barely a whisper.  
  
_santa maría, madre de dios, ruega por nosotros pecadores, ahora y en la hora de nuestra muerte..._  
  
She counts the beads and she prays and when she is done, she grabs his hand and she leads him from the pew, bowing at the entrance of it and making the sign of the cross before she leaves. Alex does the same, but in a sloppy, rushed way that belies his understanding of it's significance. He is 6, and his mother is on her way to a 12 hour shift at the resort she works at, the second job she has in order to keep food on their table and clothes on their backs.  
  
Then the hurricane comes, and it takes their table, and their clothes, and their home, and her jobs, and they leave Nevis, they board a boat and head to Uncle Peter's in New York where he has a smaller place, but an office job for his mother that will allow for him to go to a better school, and scrape by and for a little while, it feels a little bit like salvation, the hurricane a blessing in disguise.  
  
But then she gets sick. And there's no health insurance, so there's no doctor. And she continues to get sicker, Alex gets sick, and it's both of them, curled up in a bed, coughing and sweaty with fever, and all he can remember from that period is very little, but he remembers her voice, breathless and hoarse, her hands wrapped around those rosary beads, as she keeps insisting on NO HOSPITALS and she dies that way, with blood on her lips, but Alex survives. Two years later, he walks into the apartment to find Uncle Peter dead in his bed, blood, so much blood, everywhere.  
  
He throws the beads in a drawer and doesn't ever look at them again. He doesn't believe in God. He doesn't know if he ever did.

* * *

  
Alex has to admit, when Washington becomes President, he's afraid of how it will affect their relationship.  
  
If being a senator garners a lot of attention, then the Presidency magnifies it a thousandfold. Camera's always trail in his wake, journalists at the outset of every move they make, and privacy becomes a fanciful notion that exists only in the past. Secret Service go everywhere the President goes, and it's only stolen moments that they share, sometimes at Mt. Vernon, sometimes in the White House, and discretion is of the highest of priorities.  
  
He rides separately than the President most of the time, with the rest of the staff, especially if Martha is in town. The image of the First couple is an important one to maintain and represent, their wide smiles and arms raised as they wave captured almost daily in some  publication and Alex can only watch from a distance, but he really is okay with it, and that's not just something he says.  
  
Because those aforementioned stolen moments? Those are the ones where he gets to fall asleep next to the most powerful man in the world, those are just his. There's no one else there, and the man who is in every newspaper, on all of the blogs, who there are thousands of pictures of, who everyone talks about and speculates and discusses, the guy who everyone feels like they own a bit of, that's not this guy. This guy is _his_ , and only his.  
  
Every now and then, George catches him watching him sleep, opens his own bleary eyes and smiles softly with half his face pressed into the pillow. Alex is pretty much always super embarrassed to have been caught, and his expression must reflect that, because George will sometimes tease him, a sarcastic ' _awwww_ ' escaping his lips, but he always reaches out to him, pulling him close and flush with his body, and snuggling up with a kiss to Alex's forehead and a whispered declaration of love into his neck. If some kind of paradisaical afterlife exists, Alex is pretty sure this is as close to it that he's gonna get.  
  
It terrifies him to core, how much he loves him.  
  
They're heading back from a dinner for the USCAN where Washington speaks on a Friday night when the thing that Alex fears the most happens. Martha is across town at a women's conference on equal pay in the workplace and Eliza is with her, so he and the President are planning a one on one meeting when they get back to the White House to discuss some of the key points and anything else they want, and they are glossing over the talking points as they walk to their car when he hears the head of the Secret Service scream.  
  
George falls into him, and Alex accepts the weight automatically, his arms wrapping around his torso as he sags, but this is different because it's by the force of bullets, and Alex turns instinctively, understanding somewhere in his mind that he needs to shield him from anything else. Service agents have already begun to fire back and Alex begins to lower him to the ground. Red blooms strikingly on his gray suit jacket.  
  
"Alex..." He strains, and soon, 3 other service members descend upon them, hauling the President up under his arms and dragging him to the car, leaving Alex standing alone, cold to the core and in shock, not even sure of what just happened because it happened so _fast_. He's not aware of the flashbulbs everywhere, of the shouts around him, of the people rushing around helping bystanders who may have been struck. He looks at his hands and his own clothes and there's just _red_.  
  
Someone grabs him and throws him in another car, speaking quickly at him, asking him if he's alright, if he was hit, if he needs help, and somehow, he manages to croak out something about the hospital.  
  
The aide repeats herself. "Were you hit, sir?"  
  
"No. No, I wasn't hit." He hisses, incredibly irritated, and as if his brain has caught up to the situation. "Take us to the hospital, wherever they took Ge---The President. I want to be briefed on everything that's happening with him."  
  
The aides exchange looks. Protocol is that they head back to the White House, that the Press Secretary will need to discuss with him to iron out the details of what just happened (even if the truth of the matter is that none of them really KNOW what just happened, not yet), that the hospital is going to be a nightmarish hellscape of chaos but the expression on the Chief of Staff's face is clear that he doesn't quite give a shit about any of that. She clears her throat, opens her mouth to speak but Alex cuts her off.  
  
"Did I stutter?" He asks glacially, his eyes narrowing at one of them, and both straighten quickly.  
  
"No, sir."  
  
"Get us to that hospital then. Now."

* * *

  
They've already taken him into surgery by the time he fights his way into the ER and he's told by one of the agents that Martha is en route and should be there in a few minutes. He makes it explicitly clear that he wants to be in the room where they bring her in, that he has to talk to her right away, and the agent nods, knowing that he's close with the First Family and, even though they'll never mention it, they all understand that there's something else going on there. They're paid to be receptive, to be able to read people better than anyone else, and so the fact that Alex is this lit up, that his eyes are bright and he's moving at a million miles a second doesn't escape their notice.  
  
It doesn't escape Martha's notice either, once she arrives, and he finds himself on the receiving end of Eliza's grip, being dragged out of their private waiting area and into the hall after he snaps on a nurse for the fifth time. She grabs both his forearms, forcing him to stay still.  
  
"Alex, go home. There's nothing you can do here right now, and you're freaking out, and I get it but if you can't keep it together, you're not helping him any being here." Eliza's grip is firm around his wrists, rubbing circle with her thumbs in an attempt to calm him down. It doesn't work, and he looks at her as if she's just ask him to swan dive directly off the Capitol building's rotunda.

"Alex. People are gonna notice the way you're acting. It's not a concerned colleague, it's something else. And I understand, you know I do. Look, the best doctors in the entire world are in there right now. They don't know how long the surgery is going to take. I will call you immediately, I swear to God, but you have got to chill. Go home. Change clothes, take a shower and wash off..."  
  
She trails off, worry all over her face, because she can't say the words _all the blood, all of Washington's blood_ , and he deflates, because she's right. He starts nodding, taking a deep breath, a deep ache starting to become present in his head from all of the adrenaline and he seems to sink in on himself. He looks at her suddenly as if everything has come crashing to a halt, his instinct to **_dododo_ ** being stilled by those closest to him and he takes a shaky breath, suddenly able to feel the weight of situation at hand.  
  
"Tell me he's going to be alright."  
  
She licks her lips and presses them together in silence for a moment; she's not in the business of making promises she can't absolutely keep, so instead she presses a kiss to his forehead and rubs his arms.  
  
"Go home. Shower. Take some time. I will call you as soon as they're done. Within seconds. Milliseconds even. I _promise_."  
  
He somehow finds his way out of the hospital. In the chaos of what is happening, he is barely noticed, save for the one or two reporters who shove microphones in his face as he walks by; he doesn't even really see them. He's in his head now, going over what they'll have to do during his convalescence, not even beginning to think about the process of what they're going to have to worry about it if...  
  
He shakes it away. He doesn't want to think about that.  
  
He gets in a cab and arrives home without any other fanfare and drags himself up to his apartment. It's a little after midnight, it's been about 2 hours since everything happened, and he's checking his phone incessantly to see if any of the numerous calls and texts he's received are from Eliza. He quickly shoots of a text to John, calls Lafayette and tries to calm him down, tells him he should go to the hospital, that yes, he was there but Martha asked him to go home, to change because of the...but that he'll be back soon.  
  
He strips off his clothes and throws them in the corner; he probably won't get them dry cleaned, he thinks, probably won't want to wear _that_ suit ever again, because he doesn't know if he'll ever want to think about the moment George fell into him, doesn't want to relive seeing all of the blood that stains it...  
  
The water falls over him from his rainfall shower-head. Maybe being alone isn't the best idea.  
  
He falls into bed in only a fresh pair of boxers, not even combing his wet hair. He wraps his arms around the pillow and breathes in. He can't sleep, which is totally not a surprise, and the sheets haven't been washed in about a month and they smell like George (another set of those stolen moments, so very rare now), so he lays there for a little bit, just soaking it in, but his mind is racing and like it always happens with him, when his mind is racing, staying still is not something he can do.  
  
He climbs out of bed and pulls on a pair of jeans, puts on a button down shirt. He's off the clock right now, so fuck them, but he can envision Washington's frown, knowing that he'd prefer for Alex to be prepared to have to deal with the press but he really doesn't think he can deal with putting on a suit right now and he heads out into the night, not really knowing where he's going but just getting _out_.  
  
He doesn't know how, but he ends up at St. Patrick's close to the National Mall; he supposes maybe it's because there's really no where else he can go at nearly 2 am in DC to find some kind of sanctuary. He goes inside, pretty sure there will be no one else around, something he's grateful for.  
  
He's not really sure what he's doing here. He doesn't believe in God, or Jesus, hasn't even thought about any of that in a really long time. George is kind of religious, he's noticed. Doesn't really flaunt it, which Alex loves, but has this sort of quiet presence with it, having been raised with religion. When he asked him about it the one time, George kind of shrugged, shaking his head.  
  
"I find it peaceful. A time for reflection. It helps me in times when I struggle with things. Helps take some of that off my shoulders."  
  
_It sounds kind of like a crutch_ , Alex remembers thinking disdainfully. But he's smart enough not to say it.  
  
And now he's standing in the middle of a nave, lined with pews and candles at the front. He goes to it and lights one, and then slides into a pew and stares at the iconography in front of him. He keeps telling himself he doesn't know why he's here, doesn't know what he's doing, and part of him really just wants to get up and go to the hospital, but he also doesn't want to piss off Martha or anyone else. He sighs, and he feels a little weird, but he can't stop himself. He has to work out what's going on in his head right now.  
  
"Look, I don't know what i'm doing here. George says this helps him when he's having a hard time. And he's been so great about it. Doesn't impress it upon me, never even mentions it but if it helps him then maybe..." He trails off, shaking his head, running a hand through his still damp hair.  
  
"I know I'm not a great person. I've done things, and I've said things to people...I don't really think a whole lot before I speak, or maybe I think too much, and I know sometimes I come off as too proud or arrogant, but I do try. He makes me want to try." He coughs out a half laugh, and he feels a sob rise in his throat that he subdues with a heavy swallow.  
  
"That's because he's good. He's so freaking good. And the country is better because he's in charge, and if you're really all knowing and all seeing, you know that. And I hate to be that guy, because there's a lot of people in the world who have it way worse than I do, but you have taken so much from me, my entire life. My home, and my family, and my friends, and I really don't know if you exist and _you can't blame me_ for doubting if you do because of all that shit, but _if_ you do, if you're here and everywhere, I need you to give me this. I need you to leave me this thing. Because it is everything. He is everything, to me, and so much to this country, and you need to give me this. Just please, leave him alone." He grinds his fist into face and faces the burning in his eyes, grinding his teeth together.  
  
"Please. _I love him_. I love him, I love him, I love him."  
  
He sits there a long time, alone with his thoughts, thankful that it's the early hours of the morning and that no one will disturb him. It's only been a couple of hours in the surgery, and he's not sure if he feels that no news is good news but he's trying not to really think about it.  
  
He's still terrified. He can feel it in his chest, clawing right in the area where his heart resides, but his mind is not quite as scrambled as it was before. He still wants to walk, wants to pace around and think through the whole what-comes-next of it all, because 6 am will be here soon and he still has a job to do. He gets up and heads out of the church, deciding to head to Capitol Hill, seeking the scenery of the National Mall to help aid him in his musings.  
  
He's in sight of it when, at 2:30 in the morning, his phone rings.  
  
It's been pinging with texts all night, and he checks everyone of them, but he hasn't gotten anything is about an hour, so now as it buzzes in his pocket, he literally jumps where he stands. He fumbles it from his pocket, stares at it's face and see's Eliza's name on the screen as it screams at him and he takes a deep breath before he pushes the green button.  
  
This is it.  
  
"Hello?" He knows his voice is reedy and strained, and god he's so afraid, he's so so afraid, but he has to know, he has to hear it...  
  
"He's out of surgery. There were two bullets, but they got them both. A little bit of internal stuff, but they patched him up." She pauses. "He's going to be fine, Alex. Martha said to tell you you should come back soon. He's going to want to see you when he wakes up."  
  
He nods up and down quickly even though she's not there to see, and he can't speak for the lump in his throat but somehow manages a strangled thank you and hangs up. He looks up, the cool night breeze chilling his face and looks in the direction of the National Mall, and sees the light of the Obama Monument, and sighs deeply, now on the other side of disaster, and thinks back about his night and muses, maybe...  
  
maybe.

**Author's Note:**

> i'm over on [tumblr](http://cattlaydee.tumblr.com/).
> 
> oh and go check out [QPQ](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5880157?view_full_work=true) if you've not read it, and/or follow [rillrill](http://lizdexia.tumblr.com/) over on tumblr, because she's the whole reason any of this exists.


End file.
